A couple of posts in the thread titled "What did you break this weekend, Part III" made me think it might be interesting to find out what kinds of injuries people have gotten from sailing. In that other thread...
Pitchpole Dave posted:
Just about broke my leg! During a good attempt at a pitchpole my leg slid under the boat in front of the dagger. Since the boat was still moving the water slammed my leg against the dagger...5 stitches and lots of bruises..

and Colin posted in reply:
Dave,
I thought I was the only one who did that! I was sailing with my brother last year on our Nacra 5.2. I stuffed the bows hard into a wave (my fault). He stumbled forward on the trapeze and dragged his back foot in the water to regain his balance. The daggerboard hit his leg and instantly caused a black golf-ball sized knot on the side of his shin (which grew to tennis-ball size and more colors). That was the end of our sailing for the day. I was wondering if anyone else ever managed to injure their crew in this manner.
* * * * *
And here is my own list of sailing-related injuries that I can remember:

One time for a Wednesday night beer-can race I was crewing for Darrell McCullough, our local Hobie dealer, on one of his Hobie 18's. We had just left the beach, and I was putting the daggerboards down. On our own Hobie 18 the boards went down fairly stiffly, so I pushed it down hard. Well, Darrell's board went down like greased lightning, taking my fingers down into the daggerboard trunk along with the top of the board. One of my fingernails (which are all very short in the first place) was stripped almost completely off and was just dangling there by a thread. There was blood all over the tramp. We went back to the beach and I said, "Well, I guess that's it for me tonight." But Darrell's father, who is ex-military, said, "What are you talking about? Don't be a wimp! Get out there and sail!" He taped up my fingernail, and Darrell and I went out and raced. Blood was dripping the whole time. Good thing there aren't many sharks on the bay side.

The second injury that was memorable happened while launching the boat at Mid-Americas many years ago north of Chicago. Had to use a concrete launching ramp, and somehow I managed to slip and broke my big toe. Sailed the whole regatta in excruciating pain. (Try trapezing with a broken big toe.)

Third memorable injury I had was also on our Hobie 18, sailing at Bay Week on Lake Erie one year long ago. We had a distance race around the islands. While on a reach, double-trapped, Rick lost his balance and got thrown forward -- right into me, knocking my feet out from under me. I didn't totally fall in the water, but my right shin impacted hard on the rubrail about a third of the way up from my ankle. For many years there was a noticeable dent in my shinbone and no feeling in the area of the dent.

That's about it for me. I'm not counting, of course, all the hundreds of mysterious cuts and bruises over 50 years of sailing. When we are racing, we tend not to even notice when we have been injured until we start seeing blood on the boat. And then we have no idea when it happened or what caused it.

So what injuries have YOU had related to beach cats -- whether on or off the water? Your back or rotator cuff injured raising a mast? Serious infection from sailing in saltwater when you had a cut or abrasion? Long hair caught in a block? Hit in the face by a mast-rotator bar? Shocked by lightning?

And while we are at it, what are the most likely causes of injury while sailing? and also while on shore rigging the boat?